


Ashleshā

by flamethrower



Series: Awaken the Stars [1]
Category: Original Work
Genre: Blood and Injury, Competence Kink, Dating, Disabled Character of Color, Explosions, F/F, F/M, Family, GFY, Iraq War, LGBTQ Character of Color, Lightning - Freeform, M/M, Mayhem, Medical Procedures, Multi, Other, POV Character of Color, Physical Disability, PoW, Theft, Undercover Missions, Vietnam War, Weaponry, diverse cast, encryption fun, historical misogyny, modern earth, poc characters, safe sex
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2016-05-17
Updated: 2016-09-26
Packaged: 2018-06-08 22:31:11
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 6,396
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/6876577
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/flamethrower/pseuds/flamethrower
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Rex Vis Tjin spent most of his childhood knowing he would be career military. When his brother dies in Iraq in 2005, Rex knows that he's done. </p><p>He spends the next ten years trying to figure out what the hell he's supposed to do with the rest of his life. (See: Bad relationship choices.) He attends college because it fills the empty spaces. So does picking up solo jobs through the Department of Defense. By definition, he's a contractor--a nice, fancy term for mercenary, but at least he's got a functioning conscience. Rex is still very good with guns, infiltration, and not being noticed (unless there are explosions involved) and it pays well. Rex finds that he likes his job again, even if the DoD wants him shooting people less and paying more attention to politics. Spoilsports.</p><p>On his 36th birthday, Rex meets a redhead in a bar, and that may be one of the best things that's ever happened to him. Granted, his new favorite redhead is the reason why Rex and his family get labeled as domestic terrorists and have to flee the country. Fun times. </p><p>At least he knows Rex enemy: an unlabeled department within the DoD that's been up to sci-fi levels of weird since 1951.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Ashleshā

**Author's Note:**

  * For [norcumi](https://archiveofourown.org/users/norcumi/gifts), [JabberwockyPie](https://archiveofourown.org/users/JabberwockyPie/gifts), [imjz](https://archiveofourown.org/gifts?recipient=imjz).



> This story happened because Norcumi started a little Tumblr side-fic project she labeled Modern Dance. I couldn’t get part of the idea out of my head. In April of 2016, I finally broke down and told her about it...and then suddenly there were hundreds of pages of this story.
> 
> Basically, this is all her fault. Much love, dearest.
> 
> This is an original work of almost 500 blasted pages that is going up for sale as a REAL ACTUAL BOOK on October 31st. EBook format availability on that date is *definite* but print availability might be delayed by the printer. Fingers are crossed that this is not the case and everything will ship the day of.
> 
> What follows is a preview of the book--the entirety of the first chapter.

This, Rex reflects, is an actual disaster. A travesty. He’s going to kill Arram Haervati for doing this to him.

“Portland, Maine? Are you actually kidding me?”

“You’ve complained about your destination eight times now,” the man on the other end of his cell phone says. “I’ve been keeping count.”

“Goddammit, Haervati!” Rex flinches as his voice echoes off the walls. The terminal for Portland International is massive, and there are maybe five people around, total.

Rex switches tactics, trying to appeal to Haervati’s sense of logistics. “Do you have any idea how long it takes to drive from Portland to Trenton, Haervati?”

“No,” Haervati returns promptly, “because I am a smart person who never leaves D.C., Tjin.”

Rex rolls his eyes. “Haervati, you never leave your desk.”

“My desk is awesome. You’re just jealous.” Haervati pauses; Rex can hear him pounding away at his keyboard. “Stop blaming me, by the way. You asked for the fastest flight back to the States from Bahrain, and I got you one, right to good ol’ PWM. The thanks I’m getting sounds like the pissing and moaning of crying teenagers going through Basic.”

Rex glances up at a sign and switches direction, searching for a ticket counter that’s manned by an actual human being. The last time he tried to use a kiosk when he hadn’t slept for two days after a transatlantic flight, he wound up in Korea. Again.

“Let me put it another way,” Rex says. “It’s 8:00 a.m. on a Saturday morning, an ideal travel day with great weather, and there is _nobody_ in this stupid airport. It’s fucking creepy.”

“So, _The Langoliers_ is real? Awesome!”

Rex comes to an abrupt halt. “Haervati, that didn’t help anything. At all. Ever.”

“Made you think about it, though!”

“Fuck. You.”

Haervati laughs at him. “Come on, you know there’s no such thing as those giant anti-Pac-Man things eating stuff.”

Rex finally sees a living person manning a ticket counter. Awesome. “That’s the mini-series. You’ve never read the short story, have you?” he asks, veering directly for the agent before they can disappear and go hide wherever the hell else the rest of this airport’s population is lurking.

“Nope, can’t say that I have.”

“I really think you should,” Rex tells him. “At night. In an airport terminal. Talk to you later, Haervati.”

“Hey, wait, no, I need you to report in officially on Bahrain—” Haervati tries to say, but Rex has already disconnected the call and is smiling at the middle-aged man at the counter.

“Mornin’,” the gray-haired man says, with a weird accent that Rex doesn’t place right away. “What can I do for ya?” His skin is weathered, and his eyes are the same shade of blue as the ocean Rex just flew over. Rex suspects the agent is a former lobsterman who correctly decided that the ocean sucked.

“Hi, there,” Rex replies, trying for a smile that isn’t a grimace. “Please tell me there is a flight out of this creepy airport that would put me in Trenton, New Jersey before 8:00 p.m.”

The airline agent gives him a neutral once-over, one that says he’s thinking about calling the TSA on Rex before he notices the obvious dog tags hanging out in full view over Rex’s t-shirt. “Ah. In a hurry, are we?”

“A little bit of one, yeah,” Rex says, dropping his duffel on the ground so he can get to his wallet more easily.

“Well, I have bad news for you—Portland doesn’t have a damned thing going to Trenton.”

Rex bites back an angry sigh. Haervati is so dead. Haervati is paying for his fucking car rental. “Princeton?” he asks, even though he knows it’s even less likely than Trenton.

“Not a chance in hell.” That’s the accent, Rex remembers. Boston Down-Easter. It’s as weird to hear in this airport as it would be to hear full Southern twang in Mexico. “Got Newark listed, though.”

“When, where, how much, how long?”

The agent just seems amused by Rex’s desperation. “They pull out at eight thirty. Doesn’t leave you much time, but you don’t have to deal with security again. United Airlines Express flight, nonstop to Newark. Arrives around ten in the mornin’. Not a bad price for a one-way ticket on short notice.”

“Excellent.” Rex pays for the flight—$239.00, what the hell, that is not cheap—collects his ID along with the printed ticket, and hefts his bag up onto his shoulder again. “Thanks for helping me out.”

“No problem. You have yourself a good day there, soldier.”

Rex winces a little. Technically, he hasn’t been a soldier since 2005, but the Department of Defense is good at ignoring that shit. “Have a good morning,” he manages in a pleasant voice, and bolts at a socially acceptable pace for the terminal and his flight home.

While he waits the ten minutes before boarding, he dials up Haervati again. “You owe me a rental car out of Newark, ready at 10:00 a.m.”

“You hung up on me. I’m going to find you the shittiest vehicle that airport has ever rented,” Haervati retorts.

“I don’t care as long as it drives.” Rex picks up his bag and moves over to the observation window when too many people sit near him, trying to be neighborly or something. No, assholes, he is _on the phone._

“Bahrain, Rex.”

Rex drops his bag at his feet and leans against the glass. “They’re not letting much out. I think I cleared my entire stipend for the job just paying out bribes to collect the information I _did_ get.”

“They still think Iran is behind the bombings?”

“I don’t even think Iran knows what the hell they’re doing,” Rex says. “I’ve got rumors about arms shipments successfully smuggled in to insurgents; the kingdom itself says they’ve claimed an arms shipment; there is evidence galore, there is no evidence; everyone knows who bombed the station; nobody knows who fucking bombed the station.”

“Didn’t get to shoot anyone, huh?”

“No.” Rex thumps his head against the window. “The stress relief would have been fantastic.”

“Well, you’ve told me three things that we didn’t know stateside, so it wasn’t a complete waste of time. Wanna go back in October, see if you can stir anything up? It’s always good to send some familiar faces back to the locals, and you’re the only active contractor I have available right now who isn’t lily white.”

“Maybe,” Rex says, after thinking about it. “We’ll see if they actually announce anything. At least if I go in, Bahrain is aware that our interest is Iran. Politically, anyway. Dad blames Reagan.”

“Everyone with half a brain blames Reagan,” Haervati replies dryly. “Have a nice flight—look, I can just have a car meet you at Newark and take you home. I know you’re running on fumes, Tjin.”

Rex almost takes him up on it. If it were any other day, he probably would have. “No, but thanks, Haervati. I’ll just drive home.”

Non-stop flights are great, especially when it means he’s away from creepy Stephen King Airport in two hours. His arrival is 10:30 instead of 10:00, but Rex doesn’t care. There is a car waiting for him at the rental booth, he only has to worry about the bag he’s carrying, and home is only an hour away. Usually.

Goddamn traffic. He hates Pennsylvania drivers who flounce around on the interstate, pretending they know what they’re doing. He’s allowed to hate PA drivers; he is one, even if his own car has government plates for New Jersey.

He gets off I-95 to swap over to US 1 going south, then drives with his knees long enough to dial in his brother’s phone number. The Bluetooth earpiece picks up the signal just in time for him to put his hands back on the wheel and avoid someone veering across two lanes of traffic without turn signals. Masshole.

“Hey!” Wesley answers after five rings. “You’re stateside again. Or you fucked up.”

“I’m stateside, but not via fuckery,” Rex says, smiling a little. “Hey, look, when you were still playing pro ball, did your team ever fly into Portland, Maine?”

Wesley doesn’t even need to think about it. “Nope. Too far north. There isn’t any football in Maine. They root for the Patriots, and they’re out of Boston.”

“Got it,” Rex replies, cutting off any further details. He doesn’t really care for the game, but had kept up with football enough to know where Brian and Wesley were playing and when, just in case he needed to find them. Or help them hide a body. Whichever.

“Why?” Wesley asks.

“Gigantic fucking airport with no one in it on a prime travel day,” Rex says. “Nobody wants to find that in Maine.”

“Creepy as hell,” Wesley agrees. Finally, someone with a sensible reaction. “You headed home?”

“Working on it. Still north of Princeton, but I got the hell away from I-95. It’s like someone let out all of the asshole drivers at once.”

Wesley snickers at him. “That’s because they all know the lead asshole driver is out on the road, and they’re welcoming you home.”

Rex scowls. “I love you, too,” he says, and disconnects the call.

 

*          *          *          *

 

He parks in front of his building ten minutes before 1:00 p.m. and takes a satisfying minute to rest his head against the rental Honda’s steering wheel. He has to shower, he needs to _sleep_ , and then he needs to find a bar that doesn’t reek of alcohol and piss so he can observe his yearly tradition. He’s getting desperate enough for watering holes that aren’t also hellholes that he’d even skip the music aspect, which is getting harder to find these days.

Then again, he lives near Princeton. He might get lucky.

Rex’s building is an old brick duplex that someone converted into four apartments back in the 1940s. His half is painted red; the other half is painted an obnoxious shade of blue for reasons known only to a long-dead landlord. The current landlord is good about taking care of the inside of the building, and at this point, nobody gives a shit about exterior eyesore blue.

His apartment is in a terrible neighborhood by society’s standards, but his neighbors are awesome. They are also nosy busybodies who lie in wait for him. “Hi, Lois.”

The white-haired Black lady grins at him from her doorway on the blue side of the duplex. “Welcome back, baby. Did you have a good trip?”

Rex lifts his bag out of the trunk. “Well, I got paid for it, so I guess that makes it okay.”

“They oughta pay you better,” Lois says frankly. “Then you could afford to move out of these crappy apartments.”

“I happen to like my crappy apartment, thank you,” Rex retorts, smiling. He actually can afford to live in a better building, but when he first got out of the military, the upstairs apartment in the duplex suited his needs. Close to the river (escape) and close to the train tracks (noise), with clean water from the tap. Everything else was a fringe benefit.

Lois is definitely one of the nicer benefits. His downstairs neighbor is eighty-six and refuses to act like it, even though her fashion sense is trapped somewhere around 1982. She never goes out on warm days unless she’s wearing ankle socks with the little round bunny tails sewn on the back. Those went out of style when Rex was five, and he never lets her forget it.

“You always say you like this place.” Lois plants her hands on her frail hips and gives him a narrow-eyed, suspicious inspection. Today’s aqua-colored bunny tail bobs are just visible under the hem of her lavender skirt. “You need to gain weight. Want one of my cookies before you head upstairs?”

Rex unlocks the outer door on his side of the building. “Lois, your cookies are diabetes waiting to happen.”

“Boy, I’ve been making cookies that way my entire life, and my blood sugar is just fine!” Lois shoots back, grinning wide enough to reveal the edges of her upper palate dentures.

He hesitates after shuffling his keys around to get the next one ready. “Maybe tomorrow,” he allows, and Lois’s eyes brighten. She doesn’t get much company, he doesn’t have plans, and Rex will exchange a cookie for some of the stories Lois tells when she’s in a good mood. Her time in the WAC during World War II had been prime breeding ground for drunken debauchery and shenanigans.

Lois nods. “If you’re going out like your usual for the nineteenth, head into Princeton. Rumor’s on the wind that the cops are hitting Trenton bars tonight, sniffing out underage drinking.”

Rex frowns. That definitely cinches the idea about searching Princeton. He doesn’t like dealing with cops unless he’s related to them. “I’ll keep that in mind. Thanks, Lois.”

“Tomorrow, boy. Cookies!”

“Yes, ma’am.”

Rex passes the locked door to the first floor apartment. They all know Janice lives there; it’s just that she refuses to come out unless it’s a special occasion, like aliens invading. He still raps on her door and says hello as he passes by, and hears her cantankerous voice tell him to Fuck Off Unless He’s the Poh-Leece.

“Nice to be home, Janice!” Rex yells back. She swears at him some more, which just makes him smile as he climbs the stairs up to his door. He slides in the second key and turns the deadbolt, then swaps to a third key to unlock the doorknob. Always confuses potential thieves when they have to use two different lock pick sets to try and break in.

A Glock is also a great deterrent. Nobody’s tried to rob the mutant duplex in years.

The goal had been showering first. Rex gives up on that idea once the door is locked behind him and he gets hit by a wall of exhaustion. He drops his bag onto the bedroom floor rug, faceplants onto his bed, and sleeps until some jackass rings his phone four minutes before his alarm is set to go off.

 _Oh, god, I’m stupid_ , Rex thinks blearily, trying to make his fingers work so he can answer the call. He didn’t even take the stupid Bluetooth earpiece off when he went to bed.

“Rex, man! You made it home in time!”

He blinks a few times while staring at his bed’s spare pillow. His eyes feel gritty, like he faced down a sandstorm and lost. “What?”

“It’s your birthday, dumbass!” the cheerful male voice on the line tells him.

Rex sits up and runs his tongue over the roof of his mouth. Instant regret. It tastes like coffee died in there. “I know it’s my birthday. Why are you calling me?”

“Because it’s your birthday,” his caller repeats patiently. “We go out, we drink, we have a good time.”

Right; he remembers this man now. David Polansky, friend from Princeton U.

No, friend is the wrong word. Polansky is just an acquaintance with the intelligence of a rounded brick. “I’m not available tonight, David. I know I’ve told you why for at least three years running now.”

“Rex, man, you really can’t keep mourning some dead wicked stepmother forever. It’s your birthday, not a funeral.”

Rex grits his teeth, one hand clenching into a tight fist. “David, when you ask our other friends why I don’t speak to you any more, tell them about what you just said to me. They’ll understand completely,” he says, and hangs up. The rest of Rex’s admittedly small social circle, left over from university and the military? Not that fucking stupid.

A shower helps him feel awake, human, and less likely to murder the first person he sees. Rex washes off Creepy Stephen King Airport leftovers along with Bahrain sweat, dries off, and uses the towel to wipe the fog from the bathroom mirror. His hair is getting long enough to curl again. He can’t make up his mind about leaving it alone or shaving it all off, so he compromises and buzzes it down to fine blond fuzz, then goes to find a clean t-shirt and a pair of jeans.

Princeton has a bad habit of opening a swank new bar and then having it shut down six months later when the newness fades and the college crowd looks for the next new trend. Finding one that actually serves hard liquor is difficult, but the power of Google nets him a place north of campus, a bar and grill combo that doesn’t close until 2:00 a.m. The neighborhood is really nice, which means expensive drinks, but that’s Princeton all over: cookie-cutter neighborhoods and pretentiousness with some trees mixed in.

Saturday night traffic sucks. It takes him almost forty minutes to get north of campus and find a place to park the rental, since he still hasn’t been over to the local airport to get his own car back. He walks to the bar in cool night air that is paradise after a week in Bahrain, weaving his way through the groups on the sidewalk. Most of them are college kids, either returning for the semester or just starting out, with no real idea of what they’re in for.

The name of the place is _Maritimes_. It’s a nice pun, even if it’s the wrong town for it. Rex walks in the door and is assaulted at once by crashing waves of noise. The tables in the joint have all been claimed, the floor is crowded, and the lineup at the bar is almost shoulder-to-shoulder. Music is playing just loud enough to be heard over the din, and the moment Rex makes it out, he knows he’s in the right place.

Robert Miles. Mid-’90s electronica. Thanks for that, universe.

It takes him five minutes to get the bartender’s attention. Rex is honestly starting to wonder if he should just flag the bald bastard down with money before the man finally deigns to acknowledge Rex’s existence.

“Brandy, top shelf, tumbler on the rocks, please,” Rex says, laying his first twenty down on the bar to prove that yes, he can pay for it. A t-shirt and cargo-pocket jeans aren’t exactly fitting in with the rest of the bar’s clientele, which is a lot closer to high-end preppie than he’d expected.

“Salignac, Honey Bee, Martell XO, or Hennessy?” the bartender asks.

Rex glances up at the liquor racks in surprise. “Holy shit, you guys have Honey Bee? Definitely that.” It’s pretty much impossible to get the brandy in the U.S. unless you can import it yourself, in bulk, straight from Delhi. “Why do you have it?”

“Owner likes it,” the bartender explains, taking down the bottle.

“Then I’m really glad someone in this town has some fucking taste,” Rex replies, which earns him a noise that’s either an amused snort or an irritated grunt. Hard to tell, and the bartender isn’t big on speaking. He does his job instead: doesn’t go overboard on the ice, pours brandy almost to the rim of the glass, and then leaves Rex the hell alone. Excellent.

Rex’s cell phone vibrating against his thigh rouses him from what must have been a blank-eyed stare at the bar’s shiny racks of alcohol. He almost reaches for his ear before he remembers leaving the Bluetooth at home. He fishes the phone out of his pocket, instead, checking the caller ID before he answers.

“I hear the dulcet tones of shitty, shitty music, little brother.”

Rex sighs. “Khodī̂, you lived through this musical era, too.”

“Yes, and then I became a grown-up and started listening to Viking metal,” Khodī̂ replies. “How many sheets to the wind are you?”

Rex looks down at his glass. The ice has melted, but the water is clear. At least he drank the brandy before he spaced out. Khodī̂ might have a point about the music, too. Robert Miles has been replaced by C+C Music Factory, and not everything they produced is glittering gold.

“Just the one, so far.”

“Then I caught you in between the birthday tradition of two drinks. My timing is awesome.”

“What do you want, Khodī̂?” he asks, while signaling the bartender for another drink. The surly bastard ignores him. Rex behaves himself, and does not chuck the empty glass in the bartender’s direction just to try and get his attention.

“I was just calling to say happy birthday, and to remind you that other people celebrate their birthdays doing much more normal things than listening to bad music from the early ’90s. I mean, you’ve got the drinking part right—”

“You really need to go get fucked,” Rex says, scowling. “Seriously, you are a lot more chill when you’ve been laid sometime this millennium.”

“Like you’ve done any better,” Khodī̂ grouses.

Rex feels a wide, vengeful grin spread across his face. “I know something you don’t know, fucker,” he says, and hangs up to the delightful sounds of Khodī̂ demanding to know what the hell he’s talking about.

Rex shoves the phone back into his pocket, grin fading. Yeah, he’s actually had a relationship within this millennium, but it sucked. Nobody got what they wanted, and it literally ended in a hail of gunfire.

New personal rule that came out of 2012: No dating Russians, especially if they’re _bratva._

To be fair to Russians, Rex went specific and made it a rule not to date anyone who wouldn’t be happy about the fact that he works for the Department of Defense. He just didn’t realize that was going to narrow down his potential dating pool to what feels like a billion-to-one odds.

Goddammit, Rex still hasn’t managed to get Surly Bartender’s attention. He’s giving this asshole one more chance, and then Rex is climbing over the countertop to get his own damned drink.

“Excuse me.”

Rex gives up on flagging down the bartender when the words are repeated. He turns around, curious, and gets an eyeful of vibrant hair so red that it looks like someone set this man’s head on fire. The illusion is helped by the fact that the man has grown his hair down to his shoulders in one sleek, flaming wave. Pretty eyes, too—perfect Caribbean ocean blue, vivid and inviting. The man’s age is hard to pin, especially with the beard in the way, but it’s trimmed fashionably short, all precision and sharp angles. Rex pegs him as younger than forty, older than twenty. Flirting, maybe?

“Yeah?” Rex asks, keeping his tone polite by the barest margin. He doesn’t come out on the nineteenth of September to socialize.

To Rex’s surprise, the man’s hopeful look crumples into severe disappointment. “My apologies,” he says. “I thought you—for a moment, you reminded me of someone else.”

It’s not a pickup line, even though it easily could have been. Fire’s voice is as warm as his hair, just shy of too deep for someone his size, which is probably an inch or two shorter than Rex. There are faded Oxford notes in the man’s accent that capture Rex’s attention, too.

Curiosity gets the better of him—and he doesn’t want to be responsible for someone else’s unhappiness. Not tonight.

“You British?” Rex asks.

Fire pulls himself together and answers him. “Technically, American. Childhood transplant, earned my citizenship with military service.” He looks surprised, like he hadn’t meant to be that specific. “Again, I’m sorry to have bothered you.”

Rex shakes his head. “Nope, sorry. You can’t leave.”

Fire gives him a bewildered look, which is a nice improvement over what had looked like sudden, absolute misery. “I’m—I’m sorry?”

“You have to buy me a drink first.”

One fire-gold eyebrow rises, as does a corner of Fire’s mouth. “Oh, really?”

Rex smiles. The man might turn out to have the personality of a dull crayon hiding out in a knife drawer, but he’s damned pleasant on the eyes. “Sorry, I don’t make the rules. It’s my birthday, and it’s required.”

That earns Rex a smile just touched by polite disbelief. Definitely not a dull crayon. “I do believe I’ve heard that one before.”

“Give me a sec and I can prove it,” Rex says, holding up one finger. Fire waits with that same amused almost-smile, watching as Rex pulls his wallet out of the cargo pocket of his jeans and flips it open.

“September nineteenth, 1979,” Fire reads, drawing out the year like he’s savoring it. “I stand corrected; it is, indeed, your birthday. I’m glad. You didn’t strike me as the sort that played games.”

Rex frowns. “Those sorts of games are stupid,” he gets out, and then flinches as his new friend bellows at the top of his lungs.

“HEY, FRANCIS, YOU HALF-DEAF WANKER!”

It’s an actual miracle. The bartender turns around, a glare on his face that lessens when he identifies the shouter. “What the hell do you want, Ambrus?”

“For the last goddamned time, it’s Am- _briss_ ,” Ambrus corrects Francis, his tone only slightly less loud than the initial bellow. “This veteran has a birthday today! Get your ass down here and help him celebrate!”

“Veteran?” the college-age kid at Rex’s right shoulder asks.

Rex glances at him: blond-haired, brown-eyed, and definitely too young to have served before coming to college. “Yeah.”

“Wow. Sucks to be you, man,” the kid says, and turns back to his friends.

Ambrus decides it’s time to sit down, shoving against Rex’s sort-of sympathetic bar mate until he’s captured the seat on Rex’s right. The kids in the group just shift further down the bar, used to the constant shuffle.

“Vet?” Rex repeats, as Francis makes his slow, resentful way down the line.

“Your military ID was visible in the slot behind your driver’s license,” Ambrus says. He’s giving Rex a curious inspection that doesn’t necessarily feel like dating interest, but he also manages not to be impolite about it. “Also, nobody keeps their hair that regulation-short unless they’ve been in the habit for a long time.”

“Maybe I just like it this short,” Rex counters.

“Dog tags.” Ambrus says the words like he’s singing them. Nice tenor, too.

“Point.” Rex’s hand goes to his tags out of habit. He thought he’d tucked them in under his t-shirt, and he had, but up close, there’s an outline of the shape. “You always that observant?”

Ambrus nods. “It’s my job,” he says cryptically, which does _nothing_ to diminish Rex’s fascination in his newly discovered Brit transplant.

Francis seems less sour by the time he’s standing in front of them. “Same as before, then?” he asks Rex.

Rex glances at Ambrus. “Expensive,” he warns.

“I’m buying it anyway,” Ambrus replies. “I’ll take one, too. I think I’m going to need it—oh, Honey Bee. You are definitely not getting rid of me until this drink is done.”

Ambrus likes one of the rarest brandies available in the United States. Holy shit.

Rex is already making notes about Ambrus’s arms (muscled but not heavily so) the military-grade Timex on his right wrist (worn upside down) the mispronunciation of his name, which probably means he’s guessing right on the correct spelling (Remember: Am- _briss_ ) while also wondering where a name like Ambrus originates from. It’s kind of a hobby born of his own background. Almost no one knows where Tjin originates from unless Rex tells them.

Ambrus pays Francis in cash taken from a small roll in his pocket, not a wallet. He says something that Rex doesn’t catch, but it seems to make Francis less of a walking asshole.

After Francis wanders off to resume his surliness at other customers, Rex takes a guess. “Where did you serve?”

“Multiple posts. I never really had a stable base assignment long enough to point out one posting over another.” Ambrus sips brandy and smiles without looking at Rex. “You?”

“Some early work with the UN, followed by Afghanistan and Iraq.” Rex feels guilty sympathy when he notices some of the light leave Ambrus’s eyes. He knows that look. “I thought I’d be career when I first started, but I lost a brother in Iraq. Got out in late 2005, haven’t looked back.”

“I’m sorry. For your brother’s loss, not for your decision to get the fuck out of active service,” Ambrus clarifies.

Rex never knows what to do when offered sympathy about Eric, so he just nods. He didn’t miss the clarification on active service, so he reverts back to the original subject. “Are you still active military? You sound like someone who’s not fond of their job.”

“In a sense, yes.” Ambrus grabs a salt shaker, adds perhaps three grains to his glass of brandy, and blends it in with a swizzle stick. Weird. “I work for a department within the Department of Defense.”

Rex glances at Ambrus again. The man’s hair is nowhere near regulation short; he’s been DoD for a long time. Technically, it’s against even DoD regulations if you’re working in the Pentagon, but some of the brass remembers that it’s less about appearance and a hell of a lot more about who can do the damned job.

“You were in Iraq,” Rex says. “How bad?”

Ambrus looks at Rex from the corner of his eye before nodding. “Standard levels of bad, I suppose. Saw combat that I wasn’t supposed to see, but that’s pretty much my entire military career. Combat where combat should never be.”

“What the fuck kind of DoD work do you do that firefights sound like a common thing?” Rex doesn’t really expect an answer, even though he’s curious. There is shit his own father can’t tell him about his time with the DoD, and his active service before that, and all of it’s been over and done with for twenty-five years.

“Uh, well.” Ambrus’s smile is self-deprecating, and a lot hotter than it has any right to be. “I have actually hit the limit of what I’m allowed to say about my work.”

“NDAs?”

A faint line appears between Ambrus’s eyebrows. “Non-disclosure agreements make it very fucking difficult to talk to people.”

“Yeah, they do,” Rex agrees. Ambrus is startled by that, as if he hadn’t expected any kind of solidarity. “I’ve been picking up DoD contracts since I finished college. When friends ask, ‘So, what did you do this weekend?’ the answer they want does not involve a stack of papers to sign and a blood oath that they won’t repeat anything I tell them.”

Ambrus’s laugh is a near-silent chuckle that just ramps up Rex’s interest in the other man. He never thought he’d go for the bearded type, or the vaguely British type, but he’s quickly discovering that he can make exceptions.

“How do you communicate with your friends if you don’t talk about work?” Ambrus asks.

Rex feels a cold chill, a warning that he could easily say the wrong thing in this moment. He suspects Ambrus doesn’t have a lot of people outside of the DoD to talk to, and that’s depressing. Rex isn’t great with people, but he still speaks to his neighbors, the few friends he made in college—not David Polansky—and his asshole siblings.

“Well, there are movies, music, video games…uh, music.” Shit, maybe he needs a real hobby aside from DoD contracts and shooting things. He couldn’t name anything else right now to save his life.

The only subject he hasn’t mentioned? It’s _way_ too early for that one.

“Music does actually give me a place to start,” Ambrus says, as Reel to Real gives way to Loreena McKennitt. Someone needs to fire this stupid DJ. “’90s Nostalgia Night is a hell of a choice for a first trip into a club. Maritimes doesn’t even advertise the occasion. Why choose it?”

“How do you know it’s my first time?” Rex refuses to wince after asking. Yes, brain, he is aware of the fact that it was innuendo. Shut up.

Ambrus lifts one shoulder in a shrug that is barely gesture at all. “I’m in here often; I’ve never seen you before; Francis didn’t know you. That man is a dick, but he never forgets a face. Tip well, and you’ll never have to fight for his attention again.”

Useful information on how to get more Honey Bee brandy. Awesome. “Noted. I’m here because the joint I used to go to in Trenton lost their liquor license about eight months ago, so they shut down. I had to find a new place for the birthday tradition—two drinks and a trip down memory lane.”

Ambrus runs his finger along the rim of his glass. Most of the brandy is already gone. “Nobody should have to spend their birthday grieving what’s been lost.”

Rex refuses to stare at Ambrus, even if he’s a little bit creeped out. It isn’t just the accurate guess, but the other man’s posture and voice. “Insightful.”

“Grief and I are very well-acquainted.” Ambrus raises his glass, shaking off the mournful air.

Rex suspects he already knows, but asks anyway. “Why are you here, then? Fair is fair.”

Ambrus smiles at Rex. “I’m here because the liquor is of good quality, and I can drink myself all but unconscious and still walk back to my apartment.”

Rex congratulates himself on his accuracy while grimacing at the idea of being that wasted. “Nobody waiting at home, huh?”

“Not even a cat.” Ambrus pauses thoughtfully. “Or a fish. My schedule’s far too erratic for any sort of pet, anyway.”

“Is it too erratic for dating?” Rex asks, and then tries not to bury his face in his hands. He hadn’t meant to ask that. Yet. Fuck.

Ambrus looks surprised by the idea. “You know—I don’t—I don’t know? I can’t even remember the last time I dated anyone.”

“That’s depressing. Unless it’s by choice,” Rex adds. His eldest brother is definitely in the “Hell no, not ever” category when it comes to dating people.

“Not by choice.” Ambrus puts his empty glass down on a coaster, slides a twenty and a ten underneath, and hops off the bar stool. “Thanks for the company, Birthday Veteran.”

Rex quickly swallows what’s left in his tumbler, copies the bit with the twenty and the ten, and stands up. “Holy shit, you are dense.”

Ambrus is already turning to leave, so when he pauses mid-motion, he’s stuck sort of twisted around, which is way more endearing than it has any right to be. “I’m what?”

“Dense,” Rex repeats, crossing his arms. “Like a fucking brick, I swear.”

Ambrus’s eyes widen. “Oh, you meant—dating. You meant _us_ and dating. I don’t—I mean—”

Rex is bracing himself for “I’m straight,” but what he gets is, “That’s probably not a good idea.”

Rex lowers his arms. “Why? It’s not like I don’t understand what the hell an NDA means. Or is the problem a lack of interest?”

Ambrus’s eyebrows go up, pursing his lips as he gives Rex a more specific version of that original curious inspection. “Oh, lack of interest is definitely _not_ the problem.”

He could keep it simple, exchange cell phone numbers, walk away.

Rex is really bad at keeping things simple. “You said you can walk to your apartment.” Walking is good; he’s definitely over the DUI limit for New Jersey, so the car will have to cope with being parked for the evening.

“Yes?” Ambrus draws out the question.

“Do you have a Blu-ray player? Pay-per-view? Fucking Netflix?” Ambrus gives Rex a cautious nod. “Great! It’s way too late in the day to actually go to a theatre. We walk to your place instead, find a movie that neither of us have seen, and watch the fucking thing while sitting in the same space. No expectations. Just two guys watching a movie.”

“Just a movie.” Ambrus tilts his head, that little half-smile making another appearance. “Don’t you think you should know my name first, Rex Vis Tjin?”

 _Holy shit, he said my last name correctly,_ Rex thinks, thrilled. Most Western tongues can’t capture the faint, musical J-sound that lurks in the middle of _Chehn_.

Rex holds out his hand. “Nice to meet you, whoever you are.”

“Euan Ambrus,” Ambrus says, accepting Rex’s hand. His fingers are warm; his palms are heavily callused. That is the hand of a man who either has really weird hobbies or fires a pistol. A lot.

“Yo-an?” Rex repeats. “What kind of a name is that?”

“Spelled E-U-A-N, derivative of Éoghan, Scots Gaelic for John before the hard G-sound came into play,” Ambrus explains, grinning. His eyes light up when he’s happy, a bright ocean blue that Rex could get used to seeing. “Well, not a derivative. It’s just that someone felt like modernizing the spelling, and well…Euan it is.”

Rex grins back. “So is this a yes, or should I fuck off?”

Ambrus pretends to think about it. “I think I can handle watching a movie with a strange man in my apartment,” he says, and leads the way to the door.

“How far?” Rex asks, once they’re on the sidewalk.

“About a mile and a quarter,” Ambrus says. Rex estimates their time at about twenty minutes, which isn’t a bad walk. The weather’s nice, Princeton is a firm believer in pedestrian-friendly sidewalks, and the crowds thin out quickly as they trek up North Harrison Street.

“Bunn Drive.” Rex bites his lip as they turn onto the road. “You live on Bunn Drive.”

“Technically, I live on Red Oak Row.”

Rex snorts. “Bunn Drive. ‘My anaconda don’t want none unless you’ve got buns, hon,’” he quotes.

Ambrus’s eyebrows slowly sink down into what is a truly magnificent glare. “I have lived here for several years, and I finally— _finally_ —had managed to stop thinking about that damned song every time I drove down my street. Then _you_ have to go and reference it!”

“I was a kid in the ’90s.” Rex grins, unrepentant. That angry glower is just as fun as Ambrus’s bright smile.

“I hate that fucking song!”

“Too bad,” Rex sing-songs back, and ducks away when Ambrus mock-swings at him.

Oh, yeah. He is in so much trouble, and it’s actually kind of awesome.

**Author's Note:**

> Ashleshā means comfort, or embracing. It is symbolized by two serpentine lines symmetrically entwining, recalling the double helix of the DNA molecule.
> 
> Pre-orders available soon!


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